Database connection

FirstSpirit stores the highly structured contents of the Content Store in a database to enable efficient, complex search requests within this data.

FirstSpirit provides a graphical user interface which enables users to create and modify structured database tables and to formulate requests. FirstSpirit implements a database abstraction layer which maps the universal FirstSpirit content type system onto the database system to be used. By means of this architecture all databases for which a database abstraction layer has been implemented can be directly used as Content-Stores. See the Technical requirements and recommendations.

A project export or import usually occurs from one database system to another.

New ID format for datasets: FirstSpirit Version 5.0 introduced a new ID format for datasets so that they could be more easily identified. The new ID format is based on the UUID standard. In the case of existing projects, the format is switched over automatically as soon as datasets are edited in the FirstSpirit project. This means that newly added or saved datasets will automatically receive a GID (“Global ID”) in FirstSpirit versions 5.0 and higher. As of FirstSpirit 5.2, the GID column within DB tables is now also indexed automatically (DBMS indexing for table columns). This only applies to new or newly imported FirstSpirit projects. In the case of existing projects, the database administrator must take the appropriate steps if GID column indexing is required. GID column indexing can be deactivated with jdbc.CREATE_INDEXES=false in the database configuration (via ServerManager) if you want to revert to the previous behavior.